90

EUROPE FROM 911 TO 1198

at Rome

Henry comes
to Rome

his attention to Italy and particularly to Rome, where the
conditions were such as to shock all earnest Christians, chief
among whom was the king himself.

Henry II had not interfered in papal elections except to
support the nominee of the Tusculan house. Conrad had
paid no heed at all to Roman politics ; he had used the Pope
as an instrument, and was not concerned as to his character.
The^situation The dissolute life of Benedict IX was notorious, and in 1044
there was the further scandal of a schism, since the rival
family of the Cresccntii set up an anti-Pope, Sylvester III.
Benedict was victorious, but he tired of his office and, it is
said, was anxious to marry; and John Gratian, a man of
high character, bought the Papacy he was anxious to reform,
and became Pope Gregory VI. Soon Benedict repented of
the bargain and sought to resume office ; and Sylvester was
still at large. It was a tangle that needed an overriding
authority to unravel, and in 1010 Henry III came to Italy
to undertake the task.

His first action on entering Italy preluded what was to
come. He summoned a synod at Pa via which passed decrees
especially against simony. On his way south he was met
by Gregory VI, whom he treated as the rightful Pope. But
Gregory had bought the Papacy and so was guilty of simony,
and a second synod, summoned tit Sutri, decreed his deposi-
tion ; he passed into exile in the Rhine district and died the
following year. Sylvester was disregarded as an intruder,
and Benedict IX, who had little claim after his resignation,
was probably deposed by a synod at Rome. At any rate,
the papal throne was now held to be vacant, and on Christmas
Day 1046, at Henry's instigation, bishop Suidgcr of Bamberg
was elected as Pope Clement II. His first act was to crown
Henry and Agnes as Emperor and Empress. At the same
time the Romans gave Henry the title of " patricius," and
thus recognised both his authority in Rome and his right to
play a leading part in papal elections.

So Henry stood at the summit of his career. After half
a century of aloofness, the king of Germany had again inter-
vened in a papal election, and rescued the Papacy from the
control of the Roman nobles ; and, as before, the effect was
to restore the prestige of the Papacy. There was an essential
difference, however. For Henry Ill's purpose was not so

The reform
of the
Papacy